Love
by flameember11
Summary: In which Jack Skellington discovers the true meaning of Christmas. Jack/Sally, one-shot.


If you'd told him, prior to the wee hours of the morning on a certain Christmas Day, that he would find a warm sensation so entrancing it was even better than the giddy feeling he received from Christmas itself, Jack Skellington would have simply laughed at you, or perhaps waved you away with a flick of his skeletal hand.

But he would have been wrong in such a case, for there he was, gazing into the ragdoll Sally's perfectly stitched eyes with an odd expression on his face, an expression none of the citizens of Halloween Town would have been able to place had they been there to see it. It was an expression of adoration and love, although it wasn't as if the dapper skeleton realized any such thing. Uncharacteristically quiet now, he glanced away from the one who loved him; his bones burned with shame - shame at his reckless actions regarding Christmas, shame at almost allowing Sandy Claws to be killed, shame for not realizing earlier the way Sally felt for him. And, perhaps most of all, the Pumpkin King felt shame for not listening to the warning of the enchanting creature before him.

Perhaps as if sensing his internal turmoil and wishing to comfort him, Sally - oh beautiful Sally, how beautiful she was, and always there for him, how could he not have noticed before? - only smiled gently before standing on her tiptoes to peck him on the cheek, obviously struggling to reach him due to his great height.

Jack would have blushed, and brightly, had he any sort of circulatory system to speak of. Instead, he simply blinked rather feebly, gulping nervously as he reached for Sally's hands, her soft cloth hands which wrapped themselves gently around his slender skeletal digits - his eye sockets opened wide as he struggled to find his metaphorical breath. Before, he had been so gallant as to stride up the hill towards her in full song - but he hadn't the slightest clue what to do next; his boldness had dissipated in an instant as he first gazed into her eyes that night, watching her run fingers through her long, beautifully red yarn hair. He was normally so confident, so excitable, so dramatic, so... well, the only way to truly describe him was to say he was himself, the one and only Jack Skellington; but he didn't feel much like the Pumpkin King - or, indeed, just plain old Jack either - at the moment.

Luckily for Jack, he didn't have to know what to do next; Sally seemed to recognize his sudden and uncharacteristic nervousness, or perhaps nervousness wasn't quite the correct word for it. Perhaps it was more of an uncertainty. What was so special about him?

He was all lines and sharp angles, with a spindly frame, and he hardly considered himself handsome - how could anyone care for him in such a romantic way, let alone fall for him as Sally evidently had? Perhaps it was the suit; after all, there was nothing remarkable about him, not in the slightest. But of course his dearest ragdoll would never be so shallow as that - to fall in love with a man based only on appearance or attire! No, no, no, he knew his line of thinking - so many thoughts racing through his possibly entirely metaphorical brain at once! - was entirely wrong.

But, then, why did she love him? He was only a rather formally dressed skeleton, quite literally, and Sally obviously was not one to care about titles such as "Pumpkin King", so what was it then? All he did was act with a certain flair and childish curiosity that caused him to be much kinder and much more flamboyant than one would expect of the leader of Halloween. He'd spoken of "meant to be" mere moments before, but he couldn't help but think then that Sally deserved someone better.

After all, he hadn't even seemed to realize how much she mattered to him, not until he'd come so close to losing her forever. Christmas had blinded him. No, Jack thought, his dearest Sally deserved more.

Yes, he had been so egotistical as to be sure he could improve Christmas, but he wasn't so certain about his ability to handle romance. After all, everyone had seen how badly his botched attempt at Christmas - or, perhaps it should have been referred to as 'Halloweenmas' - had turned out. Wouldn't a relationship only end up the same?

"Jack?"

Broken out of his reverie at the sound of her voice, he offered up a tiny smile.

Perhaps it didn't matter why; after all, all that truly mattered was the fact that Sally did - in fact - love him, for some reason that was completely unfathomable to him.

He watched - a feat which seemed impossible with vacant eye sockets - as she took a tiny, nervous step closer; he noticed for the first time her uncertain, unsteady gait as she moved, the sparkling look in her eyes that he couldn't quite place, the tiny upward quirk of her stitched-on lips as she smiled up at him. His non-existent heart would have pounded so loudly it could be heard throughout all of town, had he had one - one of Sally's soft cloth hands had landed so gently on the smooth ivory surface of his jawbone! Unconsciously he couldn't help but bend down towards her, tall and dark frame still looming, silhouetted as it was against the moon.

"Jack..."

At that moment, her soft voice still ringing in his skull, he felt his slender arms encircle her waist, as if of their own accord and as if no instruction of his was necessary. It simply felt right, holding her in such a way.

It wasn't until a few moments later that, for some odd and compelling reason, he moved to kiss her. He heard her let out a soft sigh, as if this was something she had been waiting for - and, he realized, it probably was. As odd as it felt to admit it, the embrace felt right. So right, in fact, that Jack felt a warm and fuzzy feeling spreading throughout his entire body as neither of them pulled away from the kiss, a feeling that even eclipsed the excitement he'd felt upon spotting Christmas Town for the first time.

He distantly wondered what might lie behind that other, heart-shaped door, deep in the hinterlands, but the thought buzzed out of his skull before it could truly take root.

Despite all those previous hours spent in the tall and spindly tower attached to his house, studying Christmas tales and carols to the point he was sure his skull would explode, researching formulas in a hasty attempt to explain the seemingly inexplicable, examining inanimate objects in vain, the answer was right in front of his eye sockets - and he'd never really understood it before; he'd thought taking over Christmas was the secret to it all, but it wasn't until that very moment, with Sally wrapped so fittingly in his bony arms that he never wanted to let go, that he truly realized what had been eluding him for all this time. The true meaning of Christmas, Jack Skellington realized then, was love.


End file.
